Once or Twice
by Nora Mutao Frost
Summary: Zareth AU: You thought you knew Inky? Think again...


**_Authors Notes: This is part of the Zareth AU. A little history lesson about Inky and how she ended up in Ninjago in the first place._**

 ** _Read Zareth AU before reading this!_**

 ** _Please read and review_**

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 ** _Once or Twice_**

 ** _Inky's Origin_**

Babies...two in the cradle. Make no mistake, there were two. A rarity among the Cloud Kingdom. Both with soft brown hair like their fathers, but dark blue eyes like their mother. The color of dried Ink.

Parents exhausted from producing and then taking care of a pair of infants. It was a demanding job to say the least. One cried a lot, the other cried very little. The parents had a hard time figuring out which was Noni and which was Nodia. They were after all twins so they justs refused to choose one for the other so they just decided to call the pair Inky affectionately.

Either knew not what it was like to frown. There parents loved them so. As they grew they learned to use there ink as their parents did. But of course good things never last forever. Even for the young.

It was storming one night. The little girls slept beside one another. Locked in a cuddling embrace as most twins do. Specially when they're only 2 years old. There was a light click of the window. A man with strawberry blond hair tied back in a tight braid walked into the room as silently as he could. Two other men walked in standing by the door. Another set stood by the window. The man took one of the twins while another took the other. Silently out the window they ran.

The small emerald sat in the mans hand. A portal opened and one of the men ran through with one baby while the man ran with the other.

"Are you sure she'll be alright?" Gaya asked the man in front of her as she took the infant.

"Nah she's being put into the hands of Ronin in that area. He's young and stupid...but he knows what he's doing he's got a gang he can just have look after her." He held out a bottle. "Now if you don't mind...I have an Inn to run and a wife waiting for me. Good night Gaya." He tipped his straw hat to her and left again.

a year later

Inky stood up on her bed looking out the window. She had been within the concrete room for some time now. Her bare feet, and white clothing were all she really knew about herself. All she really remembered actually.

She looked up when a piece of something was pushed into the room. Her dinner lay on a plate. She ran over and started to wolf it down. Bits of potato, and corn on her face. The chicken bone was gnawed clean. She was only allowed to eat once a day. She threw down the bone and went back to the spot she was in looking back out the barred window.

The door quietly opened and in walked a man closing the door behind him. The young girl watched him. He didn't know she was there. He was hiding. There was a large backpack on his back. She walked forward touching his hand. He jumped back and so did she. The man stared at her in fear looking around the room and seeing the bed. He turned to look at her. Fear in her eyes.

"Oh little one its alright, I won't harm you." His voice was gentle. He held out his hand. She hadn't been touched by anyone in a very long time. She gently touched his hand. "I'm Dr. Julien. Are you a nindroid?" He asked. What a silly question. She shook her head.

"Inky." She said holding up her hand letting some ink fall to the floor. He gasped.

"I was not aware you were an elemental master." He said. Was that what she was called? She just nodded. Completely unsure as to what she really was...and it never popped into her head that she might actually not be.

"Come on Inky. Something tells me you shouldn't be in here." Julien picked her up and ran out of the room. He pushed a button on his watch and the building began to explode. Men with numbers under there eyes kept coming. Julien finally got into the garden only to tumble. He pushed Inky into some bushes. "

"Stay there out of sight. I'll return later for you. I promise." He yelled so the guards would chase him and ran into the woods. Everything was quiet save for the distant gunshots. Inky wasn't to sure how long she lay there in the bushes as she was told.

"What do we have here?" Inky gasped as she was picked up by a man in a red straw hat. "Came over here wondering if the old man had dropped some goods...but its only a kid." Inky didn't like the look in the mans eye. She let loose a small ink shard into the mans eye. He yelled in pain. Glaring down at the girl in his hand. Blood oozed from the now destroyed eye socket.

"You little bitch! You took my eye…" He growled turning to walk back into the woods.

They didn't have to go very far, Ronin opened the back door to a familar printing press.

"Yo! You need another brat?"

"Ah Ronin...pleasure to see you again. A young one too."

"Yeah and she can make ink so you might be able to use her."

"Perfect...she'll save me money."

Inkys life at the press began. As for her sister Noni.

A man brought the young girl into the room. She was kicking and biting the man. Throwing her down on the floor in front of a man with his face painted like a skeleton.

"Procured this from the Ghost gang, boss."

"So...its a kid." Samukai said drinking deeply from a goblet.

"Yeah boss...but this kid has ink powers can make you whatever you wish." Samukai glared.

"Oh...lets see." He walked over grabbing the girls face and glared at her. "Give a...a thousand dollars." He said. Inky shakily began to write on the wall. It wasn't spelled at all right but the ink knew what she was talking about and before him sat a fist full of money. Inky sat on the floor panting from her effort.

"Beautiful...perfect. You'll do good here. Call those newlyweds...they'll take her in. She'll have a normal life...sometimes." He smiled down at her.

It was true she had a normal life, she even went to school. The people that adopted her were really nice and she felt like everything was going to be okay. At least...she thought…

One night as she stood in the kitchen there stood three men dressed as skeletons. She looked up at the woman and the man she had begun to call mom and dad...both dressed up the same.

"Boss wants her ink. Says he's got business to attend to at Borg tower with the Sons of Garmadon." The guy pulled out a knife and started to advance on Inky. She backed up into the kitchen table and screamed as the man went to stab her.

Ink flowed from her body out of nowhere. Everyone of them...she could feel them. Squirming, wrything, suffocating. There was nowhere for them to escape even her. Just as soon as she thought she was going to die the ink disappeared leaving behind the dead bodies. She lay there for a moment. She couldn't do anything else.

She ran…

She wasn't sure how far she'd run, but she ended up in a warehouse. Curling into a little ball she stayed there.

Some years went by and the ninja began to show up. Saving the day against a warlord named Garmadon that lived on an volcanic island.

Learning to live on ones own she was able to learn to pickpocket to take what she needed and give it to a man named Ronin who gave her food for it.

It was one summer afternoon where she swiped a pocket watch from a man in glasses. She didn't think anything of it. She didn't intend to give this watch to Ronin. There was something about it that made her calm. She placed it against her ear and fell asleep.

She felt the chain get pulled from her. The watch held up over her face. The man that stood above her wore skull gang make up and glared down at her. She was so scared.

'Oh no they found me.' she thought because she had lost her voice the night her adoptive parents died. She curled into a ball...but nothing happened. She opened her eyes to look around. What sat where the watch once was, was a $20 bill. She gasped looking around. She couldn't see where they man had gone. She looked back down at the money in her hand.

She jumped up and ran to purchase as much food as it would allow from the cheapest place she found.

Once again coming across the man she had stole the watch from. Once again with said stolen watch. That was strange...that gang finds things and steals them they don't take to giving things back. She followed him hiding in his luggage when his back was turned and boarded a train with him. The passport inside said 'Archie Darzuski'

It was a bond the two would never forget. A man named Archie who would gain a daughter who was not of that world.

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 **Afterword: Just in case you didn't get it Inkys twin sister Nodia was transferred to the Ninjago movie realm. Its been said in the series that their are many realms and Chima appeared to be one of them. So perhaps the movie is one too?**


End file.
